


Coming Out (and other extreme sports in time and space)

by Kitty Eden (TheBigCat)



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Bisexual Character, Bisexuality, Coming Out, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, LGBTQ Themes, Nonbinary Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-29 16:49:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17811743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBigCat/pseuds/Kitty%20Eden
Summary: They’ve been locked up in the depths of the basement of some alien tyrant for roughly three hours when Ace looks up from where she’s been attempting to pick the lock and says, rather conversationally, “so, I’m pretty sure I’m bisexual.”





	Coming Out (and other extreme sports in time and space)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a DW charity zine that never went through. Thanks to Richie for the readover and edits.

They’ve been locked up in the depths of the basement of some alien tyrant for roughly three hours when Ace looks up from where she’s been attempting to pick the lock and says, rather conversationally, “so, I’m pretty sure I’m bisexual.” 

The Doctor is chained to the wall by their wrists, which they’ve already determined are near-unbreakable. They look over at her from where they’ve been contemplating the wall. 

“Congratulations,” they tell her almost immediately, with complete sincerity, “and if I were not bound in place at this very moment, I would demonstrate my delight at your expression of identity to share this with me through a hug – or failing that, a tap on the nose. However,” they add, sounding slightly irritated – which makes her look up, raising an eyebrow as they continue, “not to sound flippant or dismissive of your bisexual awakening, but I  _ really  _ must ask. Is now really the time to tell me?” They shake their manacles for emphasis, making them clatter and clink together. 

She shrugs at this, and goes back to trying to jimmy the lock on their prison cell open with the back pin of her Blue Peter badge. “Figured it was as good a time as any.”

“I’m chained to a wall,” they note, quite calmly. “And we’re due to be executed tomorrow morning for treason. You couldn’t have saved it for later?”

She huffs out a short breath of air. “There might not  _ be  _ a later, if I can’t pick this lock.”

“I have utmost faith in your skills as a burgeoning locksmith,” they tell her lightly.

“Cheers, Professor. That makes one of us.” 

She forces the pin of the badge into the lock, and fumbles around with one of the paperclips that she had scrounged from the Doctor’s seemingly endless pockets, until she has it jammed in place as a makeshift tension wrench. After a couple of seconds of poking around, the paperclip snaps under too much stress and she swears briefly under her breath. She tosses the now-useless half-piece of metal in her fingers across the cell, and then looks back up at the Doctor. “I just wanted you to know,” she says, honestly. “Because – look, I know that even if we don’t get out of here before dawn, and we  _ do  _ end up being taken to the execution chamber or what-have-you; you’ll probably do something clever, or I’ll do something stupid, or maybe both of us will do something – or... whatever. What I’m saying is, we’ve got a pretty good chance of getting out of this alive.”

“But you’re worried that there’s a slim chance that we may not,” they guess. “Which is why you’ve elected to tell me now rather than later.”

She tugs another one of the appropriated paperclips from her pocket and sets about bending it into an appropriate lock-picking shape. “Maybe I just decided now was good, because you’re chained to a wall and can’t run away from me being honest with you for once?” 

Her tone is joking, but they instantly go silent at this. When they speak again, their voice is oddly subdued. “Ace. If I ever gave you the impression that I would be anything less than completely supportive of you, I sincerely apologize.”

She starts slightly, and stares at them, incredulous. “What?” she says, then, “seriously,  _ what? _ ”

They just shrug, and study her.

“I decided to tell you now because it felt like the right time and because I finally felt brave enough to do it,” she tells them. “That’s all.” She swallows. “And – all right, so maybe I was a  _ bit  _ scared of how you’d react, but – I never thought you’d kick me out of the TARDIS or anything. Not you. You’re not like that.”

“I’m glad,” they say. “Because I never would, and I never will.”

“Well, good.” Ace bites her lip. “Glad we’ve cleared that up.”

She goes back to picking the lock, and they go back to hanging off the wall by their wrists, and for a while, everything’s silent. But after a minute or two of this, they speak up again. “Ace –”

“Oh god, what is it now?” she says, already regretting her decision to come out while stuck in a locked room with them for an undefined, uncertain period of time. “Look, d’you want me to break us out of here or not?”

“You can talk and work at the same time, can’t you?”

“I  _ guess... _ ” she concedes, and continues to do just that. “Go on. What is it?”

“I only wanted to ask – if it isn’t too personal – how long have you known?”

She shifts uncomfortably and says, “well, it’s been a long while in the making, but – maybe two weeks, officially? I was just waiting for the right time to mention it.”

They nod. “So, have you found – I mean... that is to say...”

She sighs again, although this time the side of her mouth twitches up into a reluctant smile. “ _ Yes,  _ Professor; I did find your impressively huge collection of LGBT memorabilia in the back of the TARDIS wardrobe.”

“And...”

“And I am now the proud owner of a T-shirt that reads ‘I’m Bisexual,  _ You’re  _ Confused’, a comically long rainbow-patterned scarf that I’ll start wearing at the earliest opportunity, and... this.” She pauses in her work briefly and swivels around so she can unzip her jacket and show them the pink, purple and blue circular pin that she’s carefully fixed into place there. 

They smile at the sight of it. “Good,” they say, sounding satisfied. “I shall have to take you to London Pride as soon as I’m able.”

“You mean, as soon as we’re out of this bloody cell and not in danger of getting executed for treason in less than an hour.”

“Yes, precisely.” A beat. “And incidentally, how is our escape coming?”

Ace grins. “Just a sec – I think I’ve got it. Just need to...” And she twists her badge this way and that, and holds the paperclip steady, and after a second or two, there is a satisfying  _ click  _ and the door swings open. “ –  _ yes! _ ”

“You did it?” She’s not looking at them, but there’s a  _ clink  _ of chains, and then a slight grunt of pain – like they just tried to stand up and hurry forwards to join her, but somehow forgot that they were chained to the wall. “ –  _ ouch. _ I’m fine,” they add, rather sheepishly.

Ace laughs a bit and carefully nudges the door open. “Back in a sec,” she says, and steals out into the hallway to reclaim her bag of explosives, the Doctor’s umbrella, and – most importantly – their sonic screwdriver, all of which had been confiscated and placed in the locker opposite their cell just after they had been arrested and thrown in here. 

She locates all of their gear within less than a minute, and heads right back to their cell. 

“Excellent,” the Doctor calls as soon as they see her. “Setting six hundred and twenty-three, if you please.”

She aims the screwdriver at the handcuffs, and within seconds, she’s helping them scramble down to the ground as they rub their wrists and try to regain their sense of balance. 

“Excellent,” they say. “Free at last!”

She tosses them their sonic screwdriver, which they catch neatly and slip into a pocket. She hitches up her rucksack over her shoulders, and starts towards the open cell door.

“Oh, Ace – before we depart,” they say, and then their eyes soften, as if she’s given them some rare and precious gift. “Thank you.”

She blinks, thrown by this. “What for?”

“For trusting me enough to tell me,” they say, and step forwards to hug her tightly.

Professor-hugs are special; unique. There’s never any deception there and when they hug her like this, tight and warm and full of affection for her, she know they mean it. She hugs them back, just as tightly, and hopes that they understand what she can’t quite articulate in words.

“Ace?”

“Yeah?”

A breath, like they’re hesitating for some reason, and then: “I’m very proud of you. I hope you know that.”

Ace pauses too, and then smiles, and says, “yeah. Thanks, Professor.”

After another second, they withdraw and say, “I think it’s time for a hasty escape. We don’t want to be here when they come to fetch us at dawn – and we’ve got a lot to accomplish before then.”

“Well, the first thing on  _ my  _ bisexual agenda is a quick, enthusiastic prison break,” she says, grinning, “but then I reckon I can fit in ‘toppling the local government’ right after that.”

“And who am I to stand in the way of the illustrious bisexual agenda?” the Doctor asks, grinning right back at her. “In that case, lead on.” And very quickly, they add, “but no explosives!”

Ace sighs, only mildly disappointed. “Fine. So we overthrow the dictator with no explosives – easy enough. And then we go to Pride.”

“And then,” they agree, “we go to Pride.”

Ace smiles. “Wicked,” she says. 


End file.
